Once a kitchen staple, coffee makers were a mainstay of Americans’ appliance collections. Today, however, as consumers look for ways to create and serve meals which meet both health and convenience needs, air fryers have become wildly popular surpassing the total number of household coffee makers in the U.S.
But what happens when consumers’ preferred way of preparing proteins doesn’t match what’s available at the store?
National Pork Board (NPB) staff showed attendees at their 2025 Innovation Summit how consumers’ wants are at odds with what’s available to meet those needs when they purchased an average-sized pork shoulder from the grocery store only to show that it wouldn’t fit in a common air fryer. For consumers looking to get dinner on the table fast, it doesn’t make sense to purchase products that won’t work in the appliances and recipes they turn to daily.
To solve the problem, NPB is using innovation to find ways to remove barriers to repeat purchases, bringing pork to everywhere and everyday life. For pork producers, that means added value and increased demand for pork.
Creativity Builds Value
Emily Arkfeld, senior director of innovation for Triumph Foods and NPB Board Member, says, “Innovation is being creative, stepping out of the box and applying a new perspective to deliver value. It’s finding new ways to bring the product people rely on to the dinner table in ways that meet their needs.”
Harnessing data and research to drive innovation, NPB is empowering supply chain partners with smart insights and research to understand what consumers want and connect with new audiences, helping make pork a mainstay in American diets.
The most recent examples of innovative pork promotion anchored in this work are NPB’s consumer-driven Taste What Pork Can Do® and Explora Todo El Gusto Del Pork™ campaigns.
To bring these campaigns to life, NPB’s Business Intelligence and Innovation team focused on the next generation of consumers, diving deep into research to better understand the key drivers and influencers of pork demand.
On-the-go, health-conscious lifestyles of millennial and Gen Z consumers require the family meal to meet key criteria: It should be tasty, flavorful, nutritious and convenient. Pork meets those needs handily and, with added information about preferences for cultural favorites and simple recipes, these learnings were woven into the campaigns and into data shared with supply chain partners.
“People in the pork industry are looking for information they can put to work in their own systems and use to better understand what customers want,” Arkfeld said. “NPB’s data and consumer research help them understand what drives people’s choices at the grocery store and restaurants. It’s another tool to make better decisions and bring more value to the market.”
Shared Commitment
There’s a cost to doing nothing. Ensuring consumers are buying more pork more often doesn’t just secure the industry today; it ensures the future of the pork industry for years to come.
“Innovation helps deliver the products consumers are looking for, and that benefits everyone across the value chain — from producers to packers, processors and retailers,” Arkfeld said. “It also shows how the industry is working to keep pace with today’s consumers, adapt products to their needs and make sure what’s being produced lines up with what people are looking for — while using fewer natural resources and less labor.”
But more than that, innovation is creating a better understanding of consumers and helping the industry adapt to their needs. For pork producers, it’s creating a stronger, sustained demand for pork long term.
Lean how the Pork Checkoff is building a bigger appetite for pork through innovation at porkcheckoff.org/flavor.
